Realistic colour tattoo of an owl with yellow eyes, a pocket watch and a red rose on the upper arm.

Enlarged with AI from a smaller original

Owl, pocket watch and rose on upper arm

Realism · Upper arm · Colour · Photo

A realistic owl with yellow eyes sits above a gold pocket watch on a beaded chain, with a red rose and green leaves at the lower right. The feathers are shaded in browns and greys with fine highlights, and the watch face and rose petals use smooth, graduated colour. The design fills the frame, with the owl at the top and the rose anchoring the bottom.

Realism Upper arm Owl Pocket watch Rose Chain Leaves Clock face

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A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

Dear Tom,

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The owl is back in the church tower, and I swear it has taken a liking to the station clock. Last Tuesday I found it perched on the ledge outside the ticket office window, yellow eyes fixed on the face as though it were waiting for the minute hand to tell it something. Mr Haddow says it is only after the mice on the platform, but I have stopped arguing with him about owls.

I have been winding Father's watch every morning since the funeral, the way you asked me to. The chain still catches on my cardigan button, and the gold case is worn smooth where his thumb used to rest. I keep it in my apron pocket with the ticket tin, and when the 7.42 comes in late, which it does most days now, I check it against the platform clock and feel a little foolish for caring.

Mrs Pryce brought a rose cutting to the station garden in the spring, a red one she swore would never flower in this wet county. It has flowered, three great heads of it, and the petals are going dark at the edges. I cut one for the window sill on Sunday. The owl did not seem to mind.

Last night the final train was cancelled, so I sat with the lamp lit and the watch open on the counter, listening to the owl shift its feathers outside. It was twenty past nine by both clocks, and for once they agreed. I thought of you on that ship, counting the hours to home, and I left the watch open for you to find when you come through that door, which I expect will be sooner than you think.

Love, Margaret